Our mission is to join individuals and groups working in different ways to ensure that our children live in a rational, sustainable world.
When enough people abandon the belief that war is inevitable,it will become unthinkable.
War is conducted for corporate Empire. Therefore,the first step to ending war is ending corporate control of the US government.
All social justice efforts lead to the end of war, the ultimate injustice. Those who work for justice are Soldiers For Peace.

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Wednesday, November 2, 2011

OCCUPY AMERICA: CITIZENS UNITED AGAINST CORPORATE PERSONHOOD

When Adbusters Magazine called for an occupation of Wall
Street, it recommended that occupiers have a specific political goal in mind.
Their short list of suggestions included calling for a constitutional amendment
to abolish corporate personhood, the Supreme Court doctrine that corporations
are people with constitutional rights, among them the “right” to contribute
unlimited sums to elect candidates of their choice.

The occupiers have been criticized from both the left and right for adopting an
anarchical process that has led to no clear demands other than that all of the
problems besetting 99 percent of Americans be addressed. The problem is that
with members of Congress so beholden to corporate money to stay in office, none
of the things that must be done to redress their grievances will occur when the
interest of We the People conflict with those of the corporations that control
the levers of power in the US government.

It is not too late to adopt a strategy that embraces support
a constitutional amendment as the central issue by which to advance the cause
of economic and social justice for the 99 percent. The laborious decision
making process of direct democracy as practiced by the occupiers will not lead
to this outcome. It is up to each of us who support the movement to decide for
ourselves whether we will choose to promote this idea in General Assemblies
around the country and within other groups. This is a social justice issue that
should concern all Americans.
Members of local party central committees, political activist groups, unions,
churches and other organizations need to talk about the central importance of
abolishing corporate personhood in protecting the American dream and ensuring
liberty and justice for ourselves and our posterity. We can then take the
discussion from our meeting places to the town hall meetings that are already
beginning to take place across the country as the 2012 election season begins.
If we show up and ask candidates to take a position on whether or not they
would support a constitutional amendment abolishing corporate personhood, we
will easily determine who is willing to put our interests over the corporate
Puppetmasters of Congress.
We cannot be distracted by the usual half measures proposed to deal with
excessive corporate power, such as proposed constitutional amendments
introduced by Kurt Schrader, Donna Edwards and Max Baucus. Each of these would
if passed give Congress and state governments the power but not the duty to
regulate corporate money in elections. While nice in theory, it is clear that
given the conflict of interest between serving We the People and serving their
corporate patrons, the majority of members of Congress are not going to
willingly bite the hand that feeds them.
As an example, Peter DeFazio of Oregon has endorsed the Schrader amendment,
lending credence to an idea so obviously mistaken that even well known
corporate beneficiary Max Baucus is willing to promote it in a Senate version.
At least two Democratic central committees in DeFazio’s district have passed
resolutions calling for an amendment to abolish corporate personhood and others
around the state have passed or are considering similar resolutions.
The question is, even if every DCC in Oregon’s District 4 endorses such
resolutions, will Congressman DeFazio listen? A resolution to call on him and
other members of the Oregon congressional delegation narrowly failed on
procedural grounds at the last CD-4 convention. It appears certain that the
resolution will be reintroduced and passed at the next convention.
This well-known liberal Democrat ignored resolutions calling on him to back HR
676, the single payer bill that was ignored by Baucus and others during the
health care “reform” debacle that resulted in the “Affordable” Health Care Act.
That Act has proven unaffordable and to not provide health care but a bailout
for the medical insurance industry but was the bill Democratic leadership
wanted. Had DeFazio and others listened to the local Democratic Party
rank-and-file when they spoke loudly and clearly, the Democratic Party might
not be suffering the well-deserved backlash from its blatant sellout to the
corporate interests of the medical-industrial complex.
There is only one way to reclaim democracy and make our government one of, by
and for the People. We must make support of a constitutional amendment to
abolish corporate personhood a campaign issue in 2012 and beyond. Candidates
around the country are taking a pledge to amend. As they challenge incumbents
and better-known challengers in the upcoming primaries, the issue will gain
prominence in other races. Eventually it will become generally recognized that
when faced with a choice between candidates willing to prove that they are
seeking office in order to serve the interests of their constituents and not
those of their corporate patrons and themselves, the choice will be obvious. As
voters in more and more elections respond by electing candidates who have taken
the pledge to amend it will become clear that the amendment will pass.

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OUR GOAL: The eradication of war by restoring democracy in America.

OUR MISSION: To challenge the US Congress to put the needs of the people above those of their plutocratic sponsors. We can only establish democracy in America and the world by working together to abolish the "rights" of corporations and those who control them to determine the collective destiny of the Peoples of the United States and of the world.

THE PROBLEM: is not that the American government does not work. It works fine for those who own it, just not for the people of America. It is corporate control of Congress that permits the enslavement of Peoples of other nations and ultimately, Americans as well.

Now that the global economic elite are bringing their tools of subjugation to the United States, we must fight back together to ensure that the hope of government of the People, by the People and for the People does not perish from the Earth.

Together, we can mend the social fabric of a broken nation and assure liberty and justice for all the Peoples of the planet we share.

War and lack of health care are symptoms of the same disease: corporate control of the US government. That is why we must take back America for the people by working to pass a Constitutional amendment to get corporate money out of elections and abolish corporate personhood. This is the essential first step to creating true representative government.

Until Americans learn to fight their common enemy instead of each other, there is no reason to expect real change. We must put aside our differences to fight the imposition of a corporate New World Order if we are going to ensure that our children grow up in a rational, sustainable world where war is but a memory.